Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Skills and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I'd like to thank my friend the member for Cunningham for the question and congratulate her on election to this place. She is a fantastic community champion for the region, and I've known her for many years. It's great to see her in this place, representing her constituency.

It's true to say that people in her constituency, which includes Wollongong and that region, really understand the need to respond to the skills crisis in this country. They understand how important it is for workers and businesses to have the skills that are in demand, and so too does this government. That's why the first bill introduced by this government today was to create Jobs and Skills Australia, working with employers and unions, with state and territory governments and with training providers and others to make sure we fill the skill shortages across the labour market and across the economy. In many sectors, of course, those shortages are very acute indeed.

We have got a very big agenda when it comes to this area. We understand how important it is to our economy. We are dealing with—in fact, we've inherited—one of the largest public debts for any government, and if we're going to deal with those challenges then we have to grow the economy. The way to grow the economy, or at least one of the ways to grow the economy, is to invest in skills and training. But to invest billions of dollars of taxpayers money in this area, at state and federal levels, we need to understand those shortages. We need to understand where they are. We need to make sure we precisely anticipate the areas of emerging demands. That's why we'll create this body, working with the states and territories and working with employers and unions and others.

That's also why we're placing TAFE back at the centre of vocational training. TAFE has been under-resourced, has been unrecognised and, in many cases, has been neglected by the previous government. I just remind people of this: the first visit in Victoria made by Prime Minister Albanese after the election was to a TAFE college. That says everything about the priorities of the Prime Minister and this government about addressing these skill shortages in this country, and we need to do a lot more. There are shortages of course, and many people know where these are: there are shortages in aged care, disability care, children's services; the care industries generally are really, really in need of skills and labour. The OECD says we have the second-worst, if you like, or the second-highest labour shortage in the developed world, so this is a job that needs to be tackled immediately.

And it's not just for industry, it's not just for our economy and it's not just for employers. It's for workers. To provide them the skills that they need, that are in demand, means that they will have better secure employment going forward. We've got a big agenda. We can't wait to get down to it, and we started today by introducing that bill to the House. (Time expired.)